Lucy's Jewish Deli Rye - Take 1

Lucy has wanted to work on a Jewish Deli Rye for some time. She has really - ever since Varda was trying to come up with the Tzitzel that Pratzels used to make in St. Louis, a bread we too like very much. My wife and Varda share the same home town and Jewish bakery!

Then with Eric Hanner’s passing we made his Eric’s Favorite Rye several times. No wonder it was his favorite and we like it too. So my apprentice starts her JDR quest with good underpinnings.

Starting on the outside, we love the corn meal on the Tzitzel and the corn starch shine on EFR – so we decided to do both because my apprentice is just that kind of anything goes floozy baker. Plus, we want to keep our recent track record of corn in the mix intact.

Lucy wanted to up the rye in EFR’s mix and the % of whole grains to 40%. we wanted to get the hydration to around 72-74% thinking that, with a higher percent of whole grains, this wouldn’t be too wet to shape into a free form loaf. Seems most all Jewish Deli Rye you will find out there in Bread Land is shaped into a batard.

We loved the idea of using re-hydrated onions in the dough like Eric recommended but, we didn’t read his recipe about using the left over onion water for the liquid until it was too late – so we saved it for the next iteration of this bread.

Stan and Norm did a Tzitzel in the fantastic book; ‘Inside the Jewish Bakery’ that Varda leaned on to get her recipe right. Here is the link to Eric’s Favorite Rye recipe:

http://weightloss-slim.fit/node/31047/it-took-me-forever-find-erics-favorite-rye%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E%3Cp%3EVarda%E2%80%99s beautiful Tzitzel post can be found here:

http://weightloss-slim.fit/node/26383/tzitzel-bread-journey-ends%3C/a%3E%3C/p%3E%3Cp%3E%C2%A0%3Cimg src="/files/u41844/DSCN4521.JPG" alt width="800" height="600" loading="lazy">

My example won’t be as professionally baked or as pretty as theirs but we are hoping the taste will come through. We love combining similar breads to see what comes out of the union. No first first clear flour available locally but, we did have rye berries to grind and bread flour - Lucy thought there must be some first clear to be found in there somewhere!

Changes from both (or one of the two) of the recipes include: No commercial yeast or sugar so we upped the % of rye sour levain to over 30%. Added red and white malts with some Toadies for flavor and VWG to help the rye and get the poor bin based bread flour up in gluten content.

Other changes included: baking the rye bread in the oval WagnerWare turkey roaster with 1 T of water, 10 minutes of slap and folds in place of mixing to develop the gluten, no counter ferment, way too hot in this AZ kitchen for that and straight into the fridge for a 12 hour autolyse after 4 sets of S&F’s 15 minutes apart where the aromatic seeds and onions were incorporated on the 2nd and 3rd folds.

In the morning, we let the dough rest for an hour on the counter to come to room temperature after its overnight snooze. After shaping we loaded the bread into a trash bag for final proof at 85 F on the counter. The kitchen heat helped for once!

An hour later it was shaped, rolled in corn meal (per Varda’s Tzitizel) and slashed 3 times right before it was gently dropped onto the trivet of the roaster by holding onto the parchment paper. The water was added to the bottom of the DO before the lid was securely placed on top and the whole shebang placed in the hot oven.

We preheated Big Old Betsy to 450 F with stones top and bottom and baked with trapped steam at 425 F for 2 minutes before turning the oven down to 400 F for another 8 minutes of sweat baking with the lid on. When we removed the lid at the 10 minute mark, we turned the oven down to 370 F, convection setting this time. After 10 minutes, we lifted the bread out of the DO with the parchment paper and placed in directly on the stone - rotating it 180 degrees.

We continued to rotate the bread on the stone every 10 minutes until it reached 200 F. At that time we shut off the oven and let the bread come up to 205 F before removing it from the oven to a cooling rack and brushing it with the corn starch to shine it up some per Eric’s Favorite Rye. Total baking time was 35 minutes.

It browned fairly well but not as boldly baked as Varda’s was nor even our usual. Eric said to bake to 190 F but we have always thought this is a tad too low for my taste in crumb texture. We didn’t want to go past 205 F either so it would still be moist. This is the crust we got at 205 F. It is what it is. The crust went soft after the shine application.

It smelled great baking and still does on the cooling rack. The re-hydrated minced onions dominate the nose even though there wasn't very much of them but this is a good thing as far as my apprentice is concerned. Will have to wait on the crumb and will check Eric’s and Varda’s recipes to see when they recommend to cut it. We couldn't wait that long so we cut it and we were really stunned. The crumb is unbelievably soft and moist like it had cheese, YW and was Tang Zhonged! Never had deli rye like that before.

This bread just plain tastes great. We made a grilled pork, Brie and Smoked Gouda grilled cheese sandwich with the usual fixings. Normally we cut a slice of bread in half for the sammy but not this time - no way - this bread is too good to limit!. Everything on the plate was at it's very peak and the best my apprentice can muster and she put home made Dijon on the sandwich too! Home grown tomato, home made kosher dill pickle, oil cured and kalamata olives, super ripe and sweet red bell pepper, salad from the garden with the same two cheeses, steamed and grilled vegetable medley, black berries, strawberries, the sweetest most ripe Minneola from the back yard and a combo salsa (Pico de Gillo, chipotle and grilled onion and peppers left over from CDM) on chips.

Lucy is begging for some applause for this one!

Lucy won't have to come up with a better formula until we get tired of this one - and we won't ever do that. This bread was also tasty for breakfast toasted; with butter, a schmear and caramelized minneola marmalade - with berries and mango.

Formula

Rye Sour Levain	Build 1	Build 2	Total	%
RyeSD Starter	20	0	20	4.35%
Dark Whole Rye	60	60	120	26.09%
Water	60	60	120	26.09%
Total	140	120	260	56.58%

Levain Totals		%
Flour	130	28.26%
Water	130	28.26%
Hydration	100.00%

Levain % of Total	30.65%

Dough Flour		%
Bread Flour	290	63.04%
Dark Rye	40	8.70%
Dough Flour	330	71.74%

Salt	9	1.96%
Water	220	47.83%
Dough Hydration	66.67%

Total Flour	460
Water	350
T. Dough Hydration	76.09%
Whole Grain %	39.57%

Hydration w/ Adds	72.92%
Total Weight	864

Add - Ins		%
Toadies	9	1.96%
Red Rye Malt	3	0.65%
White Rye Malt	3	0.65%
VW Gluten	5	1.09%
Total	30	6.52%

Bread Spices		%
Caraway, Anise, Coriander, Fennel	8	1.74%
Caraway	2	0.43%
Minced Dried Onion - Dry Weight	5	1.09%
Total	15	3.26%

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Another great adaptation DA! I love the looks and sounds of this one. Now I have to moving on converting over my starter to rye again.

that crumb looks perfect and that sandwich has me drooling.

Best

Ian

Ian and this rye would suit you just fine surrounding some corned beef. It is one fo thos fone taasting breads perfect for meat sandwiches.

Glad you liked it Ian. I see you posted some kind of Chinese roll? Your trips are really starting to color your bakes! Way to go!

Happy baking Ian - off to Tucson tomorrow foe graduation festivities. My wife is really excited about it and said she is going to cry the whole time. Thank goodness her sister will be there to cry with her! I think Margaritas are in order. I guess men celebrate good things differently:-) Would love any kind of burger at Lindy's on 4th Avenue too!

Enjoy your graduation and congrats to your daughter.

Hi DA, Looks wonderful. Wondering what your add-ins do to the flavor. Did your wife taste it? Did it strike her Pratzel's chord? -Varda

especially the aromatic seeds and the onions really take the bread pretty far away from he Tzitzel we know and love It is closer to Erics Favorite Rye becsue of the onions but the seeds are different too. This is is much more a hearty, deep rye than Erics though due to the long retard and SD only. Even thougn it had characteristics of both it really stands on its own. as a unique Jew9ish Deli Rye.

My wife hasn't arrived home from work yet to give it a taste but, I'm sure she will say - 'This isn't Tzitzel !'

I'm sure would like it as much as I do Varda!

Lucy is still on her Tzitzel quest ...and you know how she gets when she wants something bad enough.

Happy Baking Varda

and asked her if it tasted like Tzitizel and she said 'I know Tzitzel and this isn't anything like it'. For once she is right about something and we agree :-)

What an assistant you have! It helps that she is part of such a nice family. Congratulation and wishing all the best for the graduate. Good for all of you. Great looking bread, food, and sunset.

Happy Baking

graduation festivities and thanks for the congrats. Sadly, Lucy can't come since no assistants allowed in the rental:-(

Glad you liked the post and Happy Baking to you, for me and Lucy it will contimue in about a week!

Firstly, congratulations to your daughter & her proud parents. What a feeling it must be see your child cross a major threshold of life with flying colours! All the best for her future.

All my knowledge of rye breads can be summed up in few lines, but I can recognise a great bread when I see one. Another winner from your sorcerer's hat! I also love grilled pork and bright berries.

the congratulations we will celebrate with and are very proud of her. Ah.... to be young and the world so new! This is one of those great breads any Deli would be proud to put their meat on, Will taste it as toast with a schmear this morning. Glad you liked the bread and the post.

Happy baking

It came out nice, DA! very healthy and good vehicle for all the goodies in.

Eric would be proud, DA.

-Khalid

Can't wait to see what my SIL thinks - another Pratzel's and Tzitzel aficionado. We miss Eric a lot as he was a special man. He would like bread but maybe not as much as his favorite rye bread :-) I think you would like it too. Like you say, perfect for the possible goodies that could go inside. It has one flavor than you average Deli Rye due to more rye, onions and the long retard . Can't wait to see your next bake.

Happy baking Khalid.